


Jolene

by meandminniemcg



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Voldemort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Marlene McKinnon, M/M, POV Remus Lupin, Post-Hogwarts, Remus overthinks, Sirius Black Sings, marlene mckinnon is a good friend
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-16 09:21:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29947842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meandminniemcg/pseuds/meandminniemcg
Summary: Remus can read Sirius' moods from the songs he sings - but are his conclusions correct?
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin, background James Potter/Lily Evans Potter
Comments: 6
Kudos: 7





	Jolene

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't write anything for Remus Lupin fest this year due to time problems, but I decided spontaneously to write a little thing independently from the fest and get at least the first chapter ready for Remus' birthday. Thanks to my awesome beta @dracothecupcake and to my discord friends for advice.

Today, I can’t understand what madness caused me to pick DADA of all possible subjects as a career path. The subject in which they made me feel like a monster at least once a year. Wasn’t it enough at Hogwarts? Why do I fucking continue with it now at the Oxford Merlin College? Yes, it was the subject in which I got Exceeds Expectations with the least effort, and I had tutored my classmates and younger students since first year, but still, it was the subject that harmed my mental health for at least one month a year.

After Professor Selwyn’s lecture I just want to shower for the rest of my life to remove the dirt people throw at lycanthropy patients like me, but I also can’t stand being alone. My feet carry me almost automatically to the shed behind the College’s greenhouses, where I know the only person who can remind me I’m human will be at this time.

He doesn’t even need to know I’m there. I often hang around there, where I know he will turn his back to me, and I hear him singing while he tinkers with his motorbike.

If Sirius knew, maybe he would find it creepy, maybe he would no longer want to be my friend. I mean, when we became friends, he didn’t sign up to be my wank fantasy, the man I would be both sexually and romantically attracted to. Before he came out to us, I would fantasize about a threesome with him and one of the girls he would make out with (and in the end reveal to us that kissing her felt wrong, every time the same thing, and he would snog lots of girls at Hogwarts, perhaps do even more with them, but he never spoke of more.) Until Dirk Cresswell snogged him on a dare, and Sirius stopped kissing girls. 

Sirius was withdrawn for a week, until James staged an intervention, and Sirius admitted to us that he found out that day that he liked blokes. He wouldn’t want to ever kiss Dirk again, Dirk wasn’t his type, but the kiss had been an eye-opener about the nature of his feelings for another bloke. 

James and Pete couldn’t find out who this other bloke was, and they tried hard. But Sirius kept his mouth firmly shut about it. I think Sirius probably fancies a straight bloke. 

How often I wish I were that bloke of his dreams, on my less moral days, I even wish Sirius would ask me to Polyjuice myself as that bloke, so he could have the illusion of a shag with him. But that would be highly immoral. Yet, I sometimes have that wish - more often than I like to admit, and usually it ends with a wank session in the shower.

Of course, outside my wank fantasies, I know that it’s highly immoral to borrow someone’s body to fuck, and having the body of a werewolf with all the scars and otherwise probably never getting to have sex is no excuse. 

I know this friendship with Sirius will one day lose its carefreeness, either because he has a boyfriend and I have to watch him being all lovey-dovey with the bloke, or because he finds out about the creepy things I do, like not telling him to stop nor casting a silencing charm on his bed when I overhear him wanking. 

I wish it could be me he thinks about when he moans something about curly hair and dimples. I have both, but so does James, and so do at least three other blokes from Merlin College. And _they_ don’t turn into monsters clawing off their own skin on full moon nights.

I walk past Greenhouse One, anticipating what Sirius might sing today. I can usually read his mood—sometimes even things that happened during the day—just from listening to him singing, and maybe putting an emphasis on one phrase or the other. His voice is delightfully husky, but he has a great vocal range, and I love it most when he sings Queen songs. Sometimes, he sings “Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy” and pulls someone—now that we are at Oxford, it happens to be me usually, there’s nobody else there—into a dance.

Other times he belts out “London Calling”, then I know he’s thinking of his parents. Or he sings songs by David Bowie, usually when he is planning some mischief. Sometimes he will also give a dramatic rendering of “Your Song”, “Lay All Your Love On Me,” or “SOS” (the last one usually after he’s argued with one of us). There are many other songs that show me what mood he is in. 

I love every song he sings, although whenever he sings a sad or angry song, it breaks my heart.

As I turn the last corner, around Greenhouse five, I hear an unusual sound, like a long drawn-out wailing. “Eeeheee.” Whatever that is, it doesn’t sound like a good sign.

I walk closer. From this distance, I can’t discern more yet. Sirius comes into sight. He’s polishing the rear fender of his bike with a rag, the Muggle way. _“Your smile is like a breath of spring / Your voice is soft like summer rain / And I cannot compete with you, Jolene.”_ He is singing “Jolene”! Singing a Dolly Parton song! This is bad. Sirius must have an awful heartache. I dodge behind a shrub to think for a moment. Sirius never admits easily that what he sings is related to his feelings, but I need to know why he’s singing it and need to be there for him. _“You could have your choice of men / But I could never love again / He's the only one for me, Jolene…”_ Oh fuck! Sirius is very much in love and his dream man has a girlfriend. 

Wait! The beginning of “Jolene!” Lily! Lily is Sirius’ Jolene. She has flaming locks of auburn hair and emerald eyes. Sirius fancies James! Fuck! That’s why he refuses to talk about it.

**Author's Note:**

> Songs referenced in this chapter:  
> \- "Jolene" by Dolly Parton  
> \- "Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy" by Queen  
> \- "London Calling" by The Clash  
> \- "Your Song" by Elton John  
> \- "Lay All Your Love on Me" and "SOS" by ABBA


End file.
